Cathy's Art Diary

Interesting exhibition at the Ronchini Gallery of work by the Abstract Expressionist Conrad Marca-Relli. These were large collage works using metal nailed on wood in Mondrian like patterns as well as two large paintings. You needed to see the work in the flesh to appreciate the texture of it as it really worked as an object rather than a picture.   Closes 31 January 2020

Calm exhibition at the Ronchini Gallery of new work by Richard Hoglund. The pictures are abstracts in pale stripes but are inspired by the Stations of the Cross, the Catholic idea of a series of pictures around the church as a mediation on the events leading to the Crucifixion, and are shown in series of 14 to reflect this. The smaller pictures are the same size as the Mona Lisa and the picture inspired the composition of one of the series although I must admit I can’t see how. I did think the series would look lovely in a church and would provide a meditative trail. As you know I’m not a fan of abstract work but I did like these for their precision. They had a feel of a pastel Rothko and I liked the detail when you looked close such as a sun ray effect scratched into the bottom layer of the composition in one series. The large pictures had a sense of sunrise and an interesting iridescent effect. Close son 23 March 2019

Thought provoking exhibition at the Ronchini Gallery by a group of artists who question reproducible medias from traditional books to website imagery. The commentary says it is about “the inherent fallacy of today’s mass media”. No, I’m not sure what that means either but there were some interesting work. I liked Rose Salane’s sculptures based on snippets of conversation and stories heard in public spaces. As well as creating the sculpture she invents newspaper clippings to tell the story. I liked one made of the side of an iron park bench with a plaster cast of a bag on it. Augustus Nazzaro’s detailed paintings of printed documents were stunningly produced but left me wondering why! Like the previous artists I’d seen in the gallery next door he painting an image, sanding it back and painting it again with precision detail. I assume it’s saying something about repeated reproduction of images but it felt like overkill. I loved Samuel Levi Jones’s work using out of...

Strange exhibition at the Ronchini Gallery of work by Jan Fabre. OK I’ll admit I’d done a lot on the day I saw this so I’d probably had art overload! Yes even I can do too much! The show consisted of a video, made in 2004, of the artist, in medieval armour battling himself for five hours in what looked like a warehouse. Why would you do that? Did the video last 5 hours? Who would watch it? This was shown with sculptures made from the wings of scarab beetles with of pieces of armour or skulls. I did like the skulls in wonderful iridescent colours. However some of the quotes from the artist sent me running for a reviving cup of tea! “As I write this my ego is starting to float around the living room.”   I think having typed that I’m off for another one! Closed on 12 March 2016  

Interesting exhibition at the Ronchini Gallery by Sean Lynch which was a study in the deconstruction of the Delorean business and car. There were photographs of old factories and of the journey of the old tooling presses to be reused by a fish farm. The presses are now covered in seaweed and crabs live the holes and there were wonderful photos of this.   Alongside there were pieces of the cars along with a photo of a reconstruction of one. I couldn’t find a press release on this show so you just have my conclusions! I felt it look at the nature of deconstruction plus looked at what happens to things we they no long fulfil their original function. I wonder if I was right?